My name is Garrett and today my dad brought home my first hobie cat! I'm thirteen years old have been sailing for about three years, my new ride is a 1985 H14 Turbo.Up until now, I've had to knock the old man off the tiller of his H16, but now with your help I want to pimp this thing out so I can blow his doors off.I need some parts, like jib travelers, cam cleats, cheek blocks, main blocks and various others, my pops said I have to chase down all the parts, so that's were you come in.If you could tell me the best set up for this boat and any lead you might have on parts would be greatly appreciated! I'll post some pics as the project moves forward.Oh yeah...can you say chick magnet!!

Notice that there is a separate forum concerning the Hobie 14s...May want to read as much as you can there and this entire wealth of forums.

Filling in your location in profile would help to know where to refer local parts deals if any are seen- I check Craigslist diligently for Hobie stuff. Ebay is also a good source of parts at reasonable price if you can't buy new stuff.

Also, get your own login to avoid confusion between 'selfdad' and 'self-son'?

I was just recently reading here (in a post started by selfdad) that you- in an H14 will not likely be able to 'blow the doors' off an H16 because it's too big and powerful... and likely because of the egos and all that hot air blowing off those sailing H16s? That's what it sounds like to me at least... Sounds like a challenge?

I have experienced excellent service with all of them. I particularly like Backyard Boats for new Hobie parts since they have the Hobie parts catalogs on their site. They are a local Hobie dealer in Woodbridge, Va I believe. They are very friendly and helpful. They all sell only new parts of course. For used parts, there are occasionally guys parting out boats in the classified here and also on http://www.thebeachcats.com. And as wildlatin mentioned, you also have eBay and Craigslists as good resources. Just borrow your dad's credit card and have a go. (With permission, of course)

It's true H16's have quite a bit better performance rating then H14's. But once you get your boat properly rigged and done some tuning you will likely find that your skills in skippering the boat play a major role. When I had my H16, I often found that my sailing skill would enable me to stay with or even beat H18's or Nacra's that were rated faster simply because I could maintain consistently better sail trim and tack better than they could. The fact that I'm light at only 150 lbs doesn't hurt either. So, it's not impossible.

Hey, its garrett I got my own account. The project is going well i just finished up the hulls and the detangling of the lines and shrouds...etc. I notice a penny sized hole in my main sail, sail tape should fix that up. Im looking for a tramp or hotstick if you have any thing you would like to sell contact me atpanzerfaust321@gmail.com